The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1887-01-19

mothers best friend, and employed
her lovely gift in school Of music.
He would stop there; but no; when>he
neared the place he knew he could not.
Something like stain, marring
likeness. stamped into his young
spirit by the hot contact of a
half-polluted nature, seemed yet to
make him unworthy. He could
not come to her now: though
why, or that he ever should, seemed
half in doubt. His life, so direct of
current until the Grcek-faced, Indian
footed Maun had entered it, seemed
still, as it had for months, to run
round and round in an eddy where she
had sunk out of his sight. 1t did not
seem able to straighten away upon it's
course. Yet, Celeste was there before
him, little aside and little above the
millions of the world, with that inn
ponderable something softly drawing
him to her. But he felt old and
numbed, and somehow half unclcan,
recoiIing before her whiteness. So he
did not seek her, but boarded the train
again, and, glancing through valley,
field and wood, which were beginning
to stir little with the near approach
of spring, came erelong to Charleston,
S. G. Here he had hoped to look upon
the face of his dead mother sister. but
after amonth-long search he found that
she, her husband and three children,
after Charleston was laid in ashes dur
ing the war, had gone, possibly, to
New Orleans.
So at last lie turned his face toward
the gulf, and, being whirled away
through the sunshine and the sap
witched world. felt something of the
numbing WEAKNESS that had gathered
upon him melt off and dissolve among
the buds and fresh leaves by the way
side. BY times the past and even the
object OF his journey lapsed from his
consciousness, SO reused and sweetened
were his senses by this racing through
the waking world. But at length he
was in New Orleans, and the days be-
gan to swing back, unLinge and fell
into golden ashes, as he wandered
through the quaint and bloomy By
streets, and out the long suburban
lanes that plowed away into the coun-
try through seas of freshest verdure.
1t was elixir to him; the balm. and
glow, and glitter of the tropic world.
For two weeks he went about drinking
it in, half forgetful of his mission.
Then slowly he found himself driving
the search with an unHagging fresh
ness of spirit that he had not known
for months. He was getting rested;
the springiness of youth, which he had
all but lost through overwork, was re-
turning to him. Yet when month
had dropped away his efforts remained
unrewarded.
AS at Charleston, the most minute
inquiry touching Ivyl Snaer yielded no
revealment, and the footprints of his
relatives seemed lost. Still he followed
the quest another week ere he had done
sitting; then one morning as he walked
along the Tivola Circle and crossed
its green and dewy swell, he found
himself thinking of some other field,
and at a loss which way to turn. At
his back lay the pleasant. dreamy old
city, and there below HIM, with dozens
of watcr-craft riding as if upon mir
ror, flowed the moving, sea-hke
river which, far, far away in the blue
north, sucked into its mighty trough
the limpid waters that bathed the feet
of Openstone. 1t came upon him
what fair and well-nigh illimitable
land is ours, and how doubtful task
was his.
He went down to the wharves; sew
eral great steamers were filing for
their outward journeys; one to St.
LOUIS, one to Liverpool and another
to New York. A sudden impulse
seized him. He went back to his
hotel, procured his luggage and by
ten O'Clock, with the fragrant breezes
of the Delta streaming against his fore
head, was watching the vast green
landscape melt to right and left as the
big New York steamer moved away
over the CLASSY reaches to the gulf.
Something very like pleasure bloomed
through all his being as he leaned up
on the quarter-rail and watched the
shimmering panorama unroll. Beauty
was more to him than to many. 1t
tasted sweet and thrilled him when
first beheld, not unlike some strange
delicious honeycomb fresh crushed
against the palate. 1t was his guide,
or rather the thing that lured him,
though he was scarcely conscious of it.
Somewhat as beauty in the material
world, in landscape, eye, cheek, brow
or carriage, made his young blood
blush about within his veins with pleas
IRE, the lovely in ethics and actions
stirred him. In either case within his
own senses it was pure feeling; tho
response Of something fine within to
something fine without, a taste detect
ing and guessing at the truth of life
and duty by natures finer tiavors.
At length the steamer swept out into
the open deep, and John Earring for
the first time beheld the limitless waste
before him. How filled he was! To
north and south and east and west
stretched out the fields of liquid gray,
Of liquid green, of liquid blue, shot far
and near with silver. What beauty
was here! what power, what breadth,
what dignity of motion! His perception
seemed to widen at the sight. He did
not ask for companionship now, though
that upon this palpitating hive of life
loating alone across the liquid fields,
in some measure was inevitably his.
Yet he kept apart as best hc
could. feasting himself upon the
sver-drifting dream of loneliness, and
leaving gladly to others the genial
Of speech. 1t was not that
ne was cold and uncongenial, for he
was neither OF these, but that he was
not content. He was not satisfied with
then ever oyerhnno the mrs.